How should the AA respond to the emerging new orthodoxies in architecture and city planning without losing its distinctive voice? And how should its points of difference in relation to other schools, in respect of its structure and constitution, be strengthened or modified? Paul Finch raises these and many more questions in the opening lecture of the Architectural Education Symposium. Paul Finch is currently editorial director of the AJ and group editorial director of Emap Construct. He has been a CABE commissioner since 1999, joint editor of Planning in London since 1994, and an AA council member from 1992 to 1997.